


Ailes de la Liberté: Nine

by mayalinified



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/M, Mentions of Sexual Assault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-12
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-08 12:15:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1940685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayalinified/pseuds/mayalinified
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes nine seconds for cyanide to kill a human.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ailes de la Liberté: Nine

**Author's Note:**

> If you haven't read Ailes de la Liberté this probably won't make any sense.
> 
> The ficlet to tie up the story of Mike and Nana who have, in the main story, exited the plot. Warnings for a past mention of sexual assault.

It takes nine seconds for cyanide to kill a human.

They sit together, and before they are searched, they manage to get out the pills and slip them into each other’s mouths. It’s intimate, staring into each other’s eyes and pressing fingers between their lips to push the pill inside. It's not intimate. It might have been, if they weren’t so busy holding back what threatens to come spilling out of them in the form of screams and cries and shouts.

The police had explained that since they were Jews they’d be sent to a camp along with the rest they’d rounded up. Except they would be taking “the faster path”. They knew well enough where they were headed. Erwin had explained to them before what the camps meant. Nobody came back from them.

They do not take their eyes away, and watch as both of their throats bob with the act of swallowing. Then they both close their eyes, and lean against one another. 

_…one_

Zacharie skinned his knee and his shorts were frayed where he’d managed to scuff them up after the fall from his bike. His mother would be upset for going out to play straight after Synagogue in his nice clothes, but he didn't think much about it. He hurried down the street, trying to catch up to the rest of his friends who had already made it to the park.

The early tendrils of winter were unfurling into fall and he tried his best to ignore the chill by running. His legs were always gangly and long, so sprinting was something he excelled it. His mother sometimes joked about him running in the Olympics, but he knew that was a far-fetched dream for somebody from a neighborhood like theirs.

He ran into her without meaning to, and when toppled the girl she fell hard on the ground beneath him. Her friend beside her shouted and pushed him off of her like he was a predator.

“What are you doing?! It’s muddy out here! Oh! I think you’ve hurt her!”

She helped her friend up, while he still looked down at his own hands and he pressed them into the grass for leverage.

“Are you hurt?” he heard murmured. The words between friends were hushed and finally he brought himself to look at the two girls.

The one covered in mud was a girl from down the street, Marie. The one dusting her off, with a soft pink dress and long blonde hair so bright in hue that it appeared white, was Hannah Bauer. Most people called her Nana. She was by far the prettiest girl he knew, and even though he was only twelve he could understand what it was to be shy around a beautiful girl.

“I’m sorry,” he uttered, and looked down at his own tattered shoes. Hannah didn’t stop glaring, and he could feel the heat of her gaze on him.

“You ought to watch where you’re going,” Nana said. “You could have hurt her, Zacharie.”

"I'm sorry, Nana."

"You live close to her don't you? Help me walk her home."

_…two_

“Zacharie?” she said. She couldn’t believe it. “Zacharie Saint Michel is that you?”

He looked so different now. When he was little his hair was so short, and she couldn’t remember him having any beard hair before she'd left Paris. Though, despite all differences, it was his nose that gave him away. And his height for that matter, which had only seemed to develop past the point of believable.

“Nana?” he asked, cocking his head. He had always been so calm.

She laughed softly, “Oh goodness that old nickname. I go by Hannah now. I prefer it, if you don’t mind.”

He nodded, smiling subtly, “Hannah, then. I’m…surprised to see you. I thought you’d moved to the country.”

“I had,” she explained. “But when I turned sixteen I went away to join the ballet. I…well I just found out the news that I’ve been made a principle dancer.”

He smiled wider then, “That’s wonderful news.” His voice stayed calm.

“How have you been?”

“I work at the docks now. Shipping and cargo.”

She regarded him warmly. “I’m sure you do quite well for yourself.”

“I do.” He appeared thankful for her gracious response to such an occupation. “I do what I must.”

“Don’t we all?”

“Sometimes if it isn’t strictly legal.” He smiled again, and it was mischievous in a way that made her laugh.

“We ought to stay in touch, Zacharie. I hardly know anyone in Paris now.”

“I actually just go by Michel now. It’s quite a long story.”

_…three_

Her hair was so long it was a wonder she always managed to do it up in such beautiful styles. He watched her as she stared at herself in the mirror; hands shaking and eyes wide and stained with dried, smeared make up. The blood trickled down the drain, and he stood behind her.

“You said…” Her voice was unsteady.  The knife in the sink clicks against the porcelain. “You worked with the black market did you not? Do you know anyone who could help me change my name?”

“Nana,” he asked again. “Tell me what happened?”

She was quiet for a moment and finally she spoke barely loud enough to be heard over the faucet.

“Dancing with the ballet isn’t enough, money is hard to come by. Other girls…take to the older men who are patrons at the opera. It happens all the time.”

He watched her clench her jaw as she continued.

“I tried to tell him no, but he wouldn’t listen to me. He did it all the time. I couldn’t let him take me again.”

He stared silently, and she didn’t say another word.

“We’ll have to change your appearance as well.”

She nodded. “Then cut my hair off. Make me look like a boy. I don't care what it takes.”

He wouldn’t protest to what she wished. He was gentle with her, and watched as hair fell to the ground.

_…four_

She was comfortable as a boy. Sometimes it was pleasing to be that way, it was safer for one. But she did like the way trousers and shirts fit. She liked to walk down the road and have people call her “him”.

She liked dresses sometimes still, too. She liked lace and stockings. She missed corsets every now and again. That’s why the job was perfect.

“I can move out, Michel,” she clapped her hands together gleefully. “I’m surprised they wanted me. I never thought I was a good singer.”

He smiled. “You were always a good singer, Nanaba.”

Her new name always sounded so nice when he said it.

“Will you come see me?” she asked. “It’s called the Ailes de la Liberté. I know it’s a rather strange name…”

“I will. You know I will.”

She grinned ear to ear. “I’m happy. Thank you, Michel. For everything.” She hugged him tightly.

… _five_

It had taken so long for him to admit that he was in love with her and now he was too terrifying to admit to her. So he resigned to watching her, and it was so wonderful to watch her dance and speak and do most anything. His lodger had noticed, the Englishman. He often made jokes about him staring for too long or something of the like.

“Mike feels strange,” she said, looking at his new identification papers.

He sighs, “It feels Christian.”

Erwin sighs, “Safer for you both. Until the Nazis are out of France you're both endangered.” He looked out the window. “I ought to get down to work.”

When they were left alone they finished the bottle of wine. “I suppose it’s the last good bottle we’ll have,” She lamented. He watched her toy with the strands of her short hair. She still wore her clothes from rehearsal; the heels looked lovely on her.

“I suppose it is.”

“I’ll get used to calling you Mike. I got used to Michel.” She grabbed his hand and held it from across the table. “After all it doesn’t change who you are. You’re still my dear friend.”

… _six_

She hadn’t been kissed in years. His mouth was so soft, and he was so gentle. He held her like a fragile thing, and it was strange to be regarded in such a way, but not unpleasant.

“Nana,” he said against her neck. “I’ve…I’ve waited so long.” His mouth was so warm, and she could feel the wetness between her legs as he slid his hands over her hips.

“Mike,” she exhaled. “Take me home. Make love to me.”

He didn’t waste time calling a cab to the Ailes. They were home after what seemed like decades, and Mike’s bed was familiar to her from a time she still had trouble forgetting. She touched the pillows and sheets as he pulled her stockings off.

“You let me sleep here for such a long time. I felt bad every night.”

He kissed her inner ankle and she shivered. He could see all of her. It was strange to have a man look down between her legs and for her not to cower away. Stranger still, to have him look at her as if she were beautiful.

“You always said as much.”

“I did always feel terrible.”

His lips made his way back to hers.

“I did it because I cared for you. I always have, Nana.”

… _seven_

Everything about her when they made love was beautiful. She would make sounds that made it hard for him to breathe. She would take him inside of her and he would feel her warmth and her depth until he was shaking in her arms. She would tell him how to take her, and instruct him where he would touch her and how he would let her ride him.

“You always…watch me,” she panted, groaning with every fell of her hips.

He pulled gently at her hand, indicating he wanted a kiss. She obliged with a smile.

“I’m in love with you.” He mumbled against her lips. “I can’t help that I don’t want to look away.”

She smiled and then leaned back enough so he could see her brow furrow when she reached just the right angle. He held her hips in place and she let him buck up into her.

“I want to marry you,” he added. “I’d like a life with you.”

She stilled. “I don’t want that.”

He stilled. “Then…”

His eyes stayed on hers. “Then we will do whatever makes you happy.”

“This makes me happy. Taking up a normal sort of life…I can’t imagine that right now.” They had guns on the tables, and blood on their hands.

He kissed her again. “It’s alright.” She moved her hips again and again until he finished. They fell asleep entangled. It was strange in those days, to have any moments when she wasn’t touching him.

… _eight_

“I’d die without you,” she says.

They stood alone together in the Ailes. Mike was nursing the cut on his knuckle from the fight. She watched, buttoning her shirt. He had come to gather her, explaining that she ought to not walk alone now.

“You’d be alright, Nana.”

She shakes her head, grabbing his forearms. “Mike I wouldn’t want to live in a world you weren’t in.”

He blinks. “You don’t mean that.”

It’s true that it’s not like her to give up on surviving. She’d been doing it all her life. He’d helped, yes, but the credit was her own.

But he was the exception to everything. She didn’t feel any less strong without his support or any more strong because he was there beside her. He loved that strength in her, and she loved him. Enough to know that a world without him would be one she couldn’t wholeheartedly care to live in.

“I love you,” she says. She had to lean on her tip toes to reach his mouth, but he bent enough downward that she was able to.

“I love you,” he murmurs.

“This war is hell.”

He nodded. “Yes. But we’ll keep fighting.”

“We will. And if we die we die together.”

He stared for a moment, still as calm as he always was.

“I wouldn’t let you die alone, Nana.”

She smiled, "I wouldn't let you die without me." 

_Nine._


End file.
